


One More Kiss

by dandelion_clock



Series: Cry for the Moon [9]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, M/M, Marauders
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-21
Updated: 2018-10-21
Packaged: 2019-08-05 07:51:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16363856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dandelion_clock/pseuds/dandelion_clock
Summary: Voldemort’s body lies, shrivelled and white, on the floor of the Great Hall at Hogwarts. And Harry’s living friends are crowding around him, their voices a clamour of joy and astonishment.Lily gives her son one last long, longing look. And then turns to her companions and smiles. 'Hello, Remus.'





	One More Kiss

'I guess that's it then.'  
'We'd better get going.'  
'I suppose so, yes. It's just. Oh, _James - '_  
'I know.'  
'He'll be alright without us, won't he?'  
'He'll be bloody brilliant, Lily.' 

Voldemort's body lies, shrivelled and white, on the floor of the Great Hall at Hogwarts. And Harry's living friends are crowding around him, their voices a clamour of joy and astonishment. 

Lily gives her son one last long, longing look. And then turns to her companions and smiles. 'Hello, Remus.'  
_'Lily,'_ Remus says, stunned. 'Merlin, you're - I never _imagined - '_  
And breaks off as he's tackled by James, who pulls him into a violent hug.  
'Decided to join us, you sneaky bastard!'  
_'Prongs!_ I -I never thought - '  
'And looking good! Shouldn't you be _old?'_  
'I - ' Remus stops, baffled. Because the body he's in feels _young._ Feels lithe and vital and...what? _Twenty-one?_  
'Harry summoned us,' Lily says. She pushes her husband out of the way and kisses Remus on both cheeks. 'I don't really know how the magic works but I guess he needed us all to look _whole._ Before any of the bad stuff.'  
'But we're still - if he doesn't need us now - ' Remus cuts himself off fast, catching the look on Lily's face.  
'Perhaps,' James says, touching her arm, 'it was meant to give us something too.' 

Remus looks down at his hands. They're thin and pale, and not unfamiliar, but they're not the ones that put a ring on Dora's finger. They're not the hands that changed Teddy's nappies, or warmed his bottles, or rocked his cot. Their not even the hands that Sirius - 

_Sirius._

He's standing right there, just behind James, all casual elegance and tousled dark curls. A slight smile curving his beautiful mouth. Waiting for Remus at the end of the world. 

Lily takes her husband's hand. 'We'll go ahead,' she says gently. 'Give the pair of you a chance to catch up.'  
'But - ' Remus starts, panicked.  
'It's okay, Moony. We'll see you in a minute.' 

Her smile is so loving that it makes his chest hurt. 

And then they walk away, or perhaps fade out. Remus sort of misses the moment. 

'Sirius.'  
'Hey.'  
_'Sirius. Fuck.'_  
'Miss me?'  
'Merlin, what do you think?'  
'You married Tonks.'  
'You know that's not - '  
'It's alright, I guess. I mean, I was _dead...'_  
_'Only you_ could be dead _and jealous!'_

And then he's in Sirius's arms, and they're kissing as frantically as adolescents, clumsy and bruising and _furious._

'Fuck you,' Remus hisses desperately. 'You went and got killed, you were _gone_ , you _arse - '_  
'I always knew you wanted her. From the moment you fucking laid eyes on her - '  
'Get this _off - '_  
_'Moony. Fuck.'_

When Remus is able to think straight again they're somehow back in the Shrieking Shack. Tangled together, sweat cooling, on the dusty wooden floor of the kitchen.  
'You could at least have apparated us to the bedroom.'  
'I was having trouble concentrating.'  
'How much time do we have left?'  
'Til what?'  
'Til we go back to being dead.'  
'I think it happens when we let it.' 

Sirius looks the way he did perhaps a year before they first split up. When they lived just off the King's Road, in Sirius's Chelsea apartment. His face and arms are freckled and bronzed from practising Quidditch in the sun, his hair is a short, tousled mop, and his lashes are long and as dark as soot. 

Remus takes a deep breath. 

'I don't think I'm ready just yet.' 

They make it upstairs to the bedroom this time, and afterwards Sirius says, 'Have you noticed?'  
'Noticed what?' Remus asks.  
'Everything's changing.'  
'Changing how?'  
Sirius rolls his eyes. 'Just _look.'_

So Remus does, and Sirius is right. The quality of reality is… _different._ His body feels less like he's dreamt it up, and the world around him seems more detailed. Somewhere close by, he's pretty sure, a tattered black veil is fluttering soundlessly. But it seems less immediate than the smell of damp, and the cracks of light in the boarded-up windows. 

'We're... _less dead?'_ he asks, puzzled.  
'I don't have a clue,' Sirius says idly.  
'You brought it up!'  
'I know I did.'  
'But - '  
'Does it bother you?'  
'Yes, it does!'  
'Why? What are you frightened of?' 

Sirius is giving him a calculating look. As if he's beginning to formulate a thought that Remus doesn't yet dare think. And Remus isn't prepared for this, so instead he straddles Sirius's hips, and kisses the knowing smile off his lips. 

But Sirius comes back to it later, because of course he's a stubborn git. 

'I'm in, if you're up for it.'  
Remus feels his throat closing up, and his heart fluttering in his chest. 'We'd have to disappear,' he says. 'At best we'd be seen as an abomination, and at worst as a precedent. We'd have to run away, and never come back.'  
Sirius shrugs. 'I already left.'  
'What's it like? Being dead?'  
'Moony, I hate to break it to you - '  
'I don't think I had time to cross. One minute everything hurt a lot, and the next I was standing at the edge of the Forest.'  
Sirius frowns. 'You know, it's odd. I'm entirely sure that I was… _somewhere._ But right now it seems a bit like a dream. Those ones that slip away before breakfast.'  
'You're not afraid, though? Of going back?'  
'Of course not. I'd go back in a heartbeat.' 

And he would, Remus thinks, he means it. This isn't about cheating death, although of course they'd be doing that. They'd be transmuting Harry's magic, perhaps into something terrible and dark. But they'd be doing itto be with each other. And so, if they do it,they do it together. 

'Sirius,' Remus says softly. 'Sirius, I have a _son._ I'd have to begin over without him, knowing I'd never see him again.'  
'You'll never see him either way.'  
'It's _living_ with that, though, that scares me.' 

There must be something in Remus's voice, because the gleam goes out of Sirius's eyes. 'Yeah,' he says quietly. 'Alright.'  
'I'm sorry,' Remus says sadly.  
Sirius shrugs. 'Are you ready?' 

If they dither much longer, Remus thinks, it's probably going to be too late. They'll be trapped here in these strange young bodies, a gift Harry never meant to give. 

And it's time to move on, isn't it? Most of the people he loved are dead, and he can't be anything to those who are left. 

The only exception is Sirius. 

Sirius with his spitfire temper, his recklessness, and his casual arrogance. With his storm-dark eyes and his tousled curls, his fierce loyalty, and his careless brilliance. 

He's maddening and ridiculous, and Remus wants - 

Merlin, he _wants…_

'One more kiss,' Remus says. 'One more kiss and I'll say yes.' 

**Author's Note:**

> But of course, after all, they choose life.
> 
> And then they run away together into the sunset, and travel the world and have amazing adventures, and are therefore way too interesting and cool to feature in the final chapter of _The Deathly Hallows_.


End file.
